Chakma tribals urge India, Bangladesh PMs to implement 25-yr-old CHT accord.

• Four organisations of the Indian Chakma tribal communities demanded India and Bangladesh fully implement the Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHTs) Accord, signed in 1997, for the development and peace in the southeast region of the neighbouring country.
• The demand came as Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina arrived in New Delhi on a four-day visit, during which she would hold talks with her Indian counterpart Narendra Modi.
• The Chakma tribal organisations, in a joint memorandum to both Prime Ministers, urged them to take joint measures for full implementation of the Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHTs) Accord, signed on December 2, 1997 and declare the CHTs as a “region of peace”.
• Founder leader of the Chakma Development Foundation of India Suhas Chakma emphasized on the importance of implementation of the CHT Accord for regional peace and security, especially for Bangladesh, India, and Myanmar.

About Chittagong Hill Tract (CHT) Accord

• The indigenous people of Bangladesh have demanded quick implementation of the Chittagong Hill Tract (CHT) Accord signed in 1997.
• The government signed CHT accord in 1997 with Parbatya Chattogram Jana Sanghati Samity (PCJSS) representing Jumma indigenous people to end decades of armed conflict in the South Eastern region of the country.
• Protection of the land rights of Jumma people, rehabilitation, self-government and withdrawal of military from the region were the key points of the accord.
• The CHT Accord provided recognition of CHT region as a tribal-inhabited region, introducing a special governance system based on an institutional structure formed by the CHT Regional Councils and three Hill District Councils (HDCs), and transferring competencies on general administration, law and order, police (local), land and land management, development, education, health, environment and forestry’s, demilitarization of the region, resolution of land disputes, rehabilitation of returnee Jumma refugees and internally displaced persons, and the setting up of a CHT Affairs Ministry at national level.

Discontentment of Chakma leaders with implementation of the CHTs Accord

• Prominent Chakma leader and former Mizoram MLA Rashik Mohan Chakma said that though the CHTs Accord was signed 25 years ago, key provisions of the accord especially handing over of law and order and supervision of the three Hill District Councils of Bandarban, Khagrachari, and Rangamati to the CHTs Regional Council was not yet done.
• The other provisions of the accord which are not yet implemented include withdrawal of the Bangladesh Army camps established during the armed conflicts into the cantonments within the CHTs, resolution of the land disputes through the functioning of the CHTs Land Commission, and resettlement of the tribal refugees.

CHITTAGONG HILL TRACT (CHT)

• The CHT in the south-eastern part of Bangladesh comprises a total area of 13,189 sq. km. encompassing three hill districts: Bandarban ,Khagrachari and Rangamati.
• It shares borders with Myanmar on the south and southeast, India on the north and northeast, and the Chittagong district of Bangladesh on the west.
• It is one of the most diverse regions in the country.
• Home to eleven indigenous ethnic groups, collectively known as the Jumma people, these indigenous groups are distinct from the majority Bengali people of Bangladesh in respect of race, language, culture, heritage, religion, political history, and economy.
• This ethnic and religious differences that separate the Jumma people of the rest of the Bangladeshi population has been a source of permanent conflict in the region.
• After an armed conflict that lasted more than 20 years, the signing of the 1997 “CHT Accord” was regarded as the cornerstone of a new period of peaceful coexistence between the inhabitants of the Chittagong Hills Tracts and Bangladesh.